Japan 3rd in Rankings for Accepting Immigrants: U.S. Survey

December 11, 2018

Washington--Japan came third in 27-nation rankings for people's willingness to accept more immigrants, a Pew Research Center survey showed Monday.

According to the U.S. research institution's survey, conducted in the spring, 23 pct of respondents in Japan said the country should allow more immigrants, the third highest figure after 28 pct in Spain and 24 pct in the United States.

The result apparently reflected the relatively small number of foreign workers in Japan, which has yet to take the policy of actively accepting unskilled foreign workers, and concerns over serious labor shortages amid the declining depopulation, observers said.

Meanwhile, Japanese people hoped less to see immigrants reduced and want more the status quo maintained than any other country in the survey, at 13 pct and 58 pct, respectively.

The survey also showed that the proportion of respondents in Japan who see labor migration to overseas as a big problem jumped to 30 pct from 12 pct in 2002.

On Saturday, the Japanese government enacted the amended immigration control law to accept more foreign workers. This is widely seen as a major policy shift toward allowing unskilled foreign workers into Japanese industries. Jiji Press